27 out of 65 Colorado House members vote NO on making indecent exposure in the presence of minor a felony
27 out of 65 Colorado House members vote NO on making indecent exposure in the presence of minor a felony
Amongst those 27 members is Leslie Herod, who compared the bill’s language to others around the country that she deemed as “anti-trans.”
Rep. Leslie Herod, a house Democrat in Denver, Colorado, spoke before the house floor to express concerns about bill HB23-1135, claiming her colleagues explained how the language in the bill mirrored bills that have been used to discriminate against LGBT individuals and Drag performers. She said:
"These types of laws have been used to ban drag shows, to target individuals who use the restroom of the sex that they identify with—a public restroom—to charge them with felony charges. I am very concerned about the attacks against the transgender community that are happening across the country."
She was also joined by her colleague, Rep. Mary Young (D), who expressed concerns about the criminalization of individuals who may have mental illness or neurodevelopmental issues.
“...madam chair, I'm here in support of this amendment. As a psychologist have to tell you too often, inadvertently criminalizing those with serious menta illness and neurodevelopmental issues.”
“Unfortunately, many times when you have an untreated serious mental illness, you express over sexualized behavior because that is a symptom and also when you have neurodevelopmental disorder.”
The way her statements were characterized by Rep. Roger D. Hudson (R), seem to insinuate that it’s ridiculous to take into consideration factors such as individuals who are on the Autism Spectrum.
Young goes onto explain that a patient of hers who is autistic, regularly undresses without warning as a symptom of his disorder. There is little that can be done other than the implementation of an intensive behavioral plan, in an attempt to reduce the frequency of the behaviors.
As she stated in the clip, which can be found in Hudson’s tweet, she supports the bill so long as it includes the amendments that were most recently introduced, as they would help prevent vulnerable people from being abused by the law.
The purpose of this bill is to up the charges for indecent exposure in the presence of a minor from a Class 1 misdemeanor, to a Class 6 felony. The previous statute required that the a 3rd repeat offense must have been committed for it to be classified as a class 6 felony, but this amends that verbiage, and removes the “repeat offense” clause.
The bill makes indecent exposure a class 6 felony if committed in view of a person who is under 18 years of age.
The Post Millennial reported that despite the bill being filibustered for 3 hours by House Democrats on Friday, Saturday’s session resulted in the bill passing after a couple house amendments were included. You can read PM’s coverage HERE.
House Amendments that made it through before the bill passed Saturday, make it so the individual MUST know there was a minor in their presence when they engaged in indecent exposure.
They also define “child” as anyone under 15 years of age, and requires that the perpetrator must be at least 18 years of age, and 4 years older than the child.
Vote tally found here.
Yay- 37
Nay- 27
Absent- 1
PRIME SPONSORS-
Rep. S. Bird, Rep. D. Michaelson Jenet
Sen. J. Smallwood, Sen. R. Zenzinger
CO-SPONSORS-
Rep. R. Armagost, Rep. R. Bockenfeld, Rep. B. Bradley, Rep. K. DeGraaf, Rep. M. Duran, Rep. G. Evans, Rep. L. Frizell, Rep. A. Hartsook, Rep. R. Holtorf, Rep. S. Luck, Rep. M. Lynch, Rep. R. Pugliese, Rep. M. Snyder, Rep. M. Soper, Rep. R. Weinberg, Rep. D. Wilson